Speedrunning
Summary Speedrunning is the practice of beating a game as fast as possible. Many things need to be taken into account when speedrunning, such as ways to avoid dialogue, ways to go faster and ways to obtain certain abilities earlier than intended. However, many are known to play the game in a way that was not intended to be. These include the abuse of glitches, the manipulation of certain abilities to save time and some will even slow down the game and record it. Many speedrunners tend to showcase their skills to the world and serve as entertainment. Sites have already been set up that allow users to submit their own content and tricks for speedrunning games. In order for a speedrun to be executed properly, the player must have knowledge of the game from before. Repeated playthroughs are a necessity as the user could very well find a way to avoid forced dialogue or may even unlock the ability to skip a cutscene. Speedrunning is not limited to the entire game, but the reccomended way to start out, is to replay your favourite levels constantly, so that you know what paths to take and what abilities and movesets will cut time. Over time, more and more gaming companies are becoming aware of speedrunning, to the point where Nintendo has directly mentioned it numerous times in their conferences such as New Super Mario Bros U's E3 2012 reveal and The Cat Mario Show. EA even promoted Mirror's Edge with speedrunning in mind, by making the game as fast-paced as possible, and blatantly adding "Speedrun times" to your past levels, along with a Time Trial leaderboards community. It has also spawned "Awesome Games Done Quickly" which consists of speedrunners, who play to raise money for charity in order to prevent cancer, by allowing users watching their streams to donate. Examples *The Long-Jump in Super Mario 64 can save more time, than it would from running. A good example of this, is at the cross-road of Thwomp's Fortress near the Piranha Plant and Blue Thwomp, where you can long-jump towards the floating platform, that leads you to King Thwomp. This saves more time than if you were to wait for the bridge suspended over the shallow water slide to make its way over to you. This technique can be performed in both the 64 and DS versions. Alternatively, skillful players can chain together slide combos and can even hold down the A and B buttons to jump in this position. This skill is best used for going up slopes, as it will increase Mario's running speed for a brief period of time. *The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has a gltich called the "Super Side-Step" where players can hold down the L Button to lock on and repeatedly press A. This can potentially get you to the castle faster before the Sun goes down at the beginning of the game, as it covers more ground than a regular roll. You can also skip climbing down the ladder, by performing the trick while facing backwards. This was not removed in the 3DS re-release. *Sonic 2's Spindash can potentially break Oil Ocean, by allowing skillful players to chain combos together repeatedly while in the Oil. If this is done fast enough, the player can avoid all of the obstacles in both acts. *Super Mario Sunshine '''also '''features the sliding technique. This time, the player can spray water on the ground and use it to lengthen the overall sliding time. However, this effect will immediatly stop once the player slides again. Additionally, if the player combines a triple jump with a slide, while they are in the level with the 3 wooden slides, they can bypass most of the stage and descend towards the Shine Sprite. This technique can be taken to eleven, should the player have access to the Rocket Nozzle, or better yet: the Turbo Nozzle. *In Kid Icarus Uprising's first level if the player uses a fast weapon, combined with the "Lightweight" or "Superspeed" Power, they can make it all the way to the boss in under 1 minute. This effect can be manipulated, by using the Brawler Claws, which are the fastest weapon in the game. Article Examples Sources http://www.speeddemosarchive.com/ http://tasvideos.org/ http://www.speedrun.com/ Category:Gaming Terminologies